


For Want of Her

by Kylenne



Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: F/M, Female Character of Color, LGBTQ Female Character of Color, Multi, Polyamorous Character, Polyamory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-24
Updated: 2015-04-24
Packaged: 2018-03-25 13:36:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 14,644
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3812491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kylenne/pseuds/Kylenne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One night, Sebastian makes a single, life-altering decision that changes everything. But what happens the next morning, when the afterglow fades and the reality of that choice sets in? Will he still be so certain of what his heart wants--and will the woman he loves still be willing to accept the consequences? In the light of day, the answers may not be so clear.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

When she opened her eyes, there was a part of her that rather desperately screamed at her to not turn over; she recognized it as the cynical little gremlin that knew all the harsher truths its gentler cousin tried to hide from her in pity, because nothing quite sounded like that little _pendejo_. But it knew, and she knew. She knew he would not be there. Maybe if she just lay there, she wouldn't have to confront that truth. She could pretend otherwise, merrily oblivious in the romantic dream she'd lost herself in. But the gremlin was loud, and her heart pounding like a dull lead drum in her chest, and so she did not, like the everloving fool that she was.

Marisol turned over and felt the keen emptiness of that huge canopied bed when she saw the disheveled coverlet pulled back. She reached over with a trembling hand, pressing it into the indentation he left behind. It was still a little warm; he'd not long been gone.

She wondered then if she'd dreamed it all, him standing on her doorstep in the dead of night, drenched like a wet dog in a sudden downpour that had ended nearly as soon as it begun, a fickle summer storm. It had all been a blur, really; the scent of myrrh in his damp hair, with the pomade washed away and the hint of short, loose curls framing a face hovering above her own, tangled limbs and fierce kisses burning with the passion of years-long yearning. Her shoulder still ached though, at the memory of his teeth biting down on it to muffle his cries of pleasure, and she was sore in too many other places to believe it was a dream. It would have been so much simpler had it been, but since when was anything simple for her, for him, for any of them at all? Kirkwall was not a simple place, even if some of its more irritating inhabitants were.

He'd gone, when it was all said and done. The rain had ebbed and promised he'd return, swore that he had business that needed tending, but once it was done he'd return and for good. This, he swore on the name of his house; he dared not swear it on the name of the prophet he'd just betrayed with her. There was still honor left in him, he promised, even in such a forsworn oathbreaker, and he clung to it. And she understood. But that was last night, and this was the morning after, and her head was no longer swimming with impulsive passion and romantic promises. She stared at the empty space, remembering, dreaming, even weeping a little, a drop or two falling from her dark eyes to stain the rumpled sheets. Had he really come back? Did he change his mind? (He did this like normal people changed their socks.) The bed was still warm. He'd not long been gone.

Would she run after him then, like one of the weeping Antivan girls in one of Varric's tawdry stories, chasing after the man who stole her heart along with her virtue? What a sight that would have been, a tattooed apostate running into the chantry, right in the midst of morning services, weeping with a heaving bosom (always in these stories, there was a heaving bosom) for the brother she loved to come back to her. She did nothing by halves, ever, especially not causing a scene. Oh, Elthina would have really loved that.

Well, her virtue had long been ceded--that she gave to a girl in Amaranthine, thirteen years past--but still, Marisol Hawke was the finest weeping Antivan girl in all of Kirkwall. If there was but one thing she was truly good at, other than the six lovingly counted by Isabela, it was weeping. It would stand to reason, as she was its Champion, and had more cause to weep than most in the past year even in this city. So she couldn't disappoint, could she? It would be downright rude.

Not in the chantry, though. She did occasionally have some small measure of good sense, even if no one ever believed it the case, least of all her. But it was funny to think about, anyway, when her lip was quivering and her heart was breaking and she needed to laugh to keep the tears at bay.

Marisol threw the heavy duvet off, and got up to pull on her pale rose dressing gown, still in a crumpled heap at the foot of the bed from the night before. She slid into her soft slippers and walked downstairs; the manor was dim and silent. Dawn had barely broken, from a cursory glance out the window, and the household was still asleep but for her. Even Biscuit lay with his head resting on his paws before the cooled embers of the fireplace, tail twitching in a pleasant dream.

Maybe she should have been a mabari, she thought idly, chasing rabbits instead of people she shouldn't have.

She thought of Fenris, her _lobito_ , with whom she shared nights of wine and laughter and many things unsaid, for whom her very touch conjured the grim shades of his past and caused him untold suffering, and who fled from her at last, begging her forgiveness.

She thought of the Arishok, stern and taciturn and curious, who had called her worthy and beloved in the qunari manner, and who died in her arms by her own magic, because his wretched qun had demanded it.

She thought of Isabela, who shrank from her overbearing affection, and quarreled with her even as a man she loved lay dead at their feet and a throng of grateful gentry cheered his demise. Isabela quarreled with her, eyes as tumultuous as the seas she loved, and stormed out, leaving her lost and adrift in her wake, left only with twice deepened grief.

Marisol buried her face in her hands, and wept at the memory of lovers lost to her by her own endless inadequacies, and most of all, she wept for the foolish dreams of a foolish girl. How could this particular dream have been anything but foolish given who she was, with a sworn brother of the chantry, and a prince besides? All she had were foolish dreams, and poisonous hands that tainted and ruined everything and everyone she ever loved--her lovers, her family, her friends. It was why they always left her in the end, whether it was by their own two feet or by a funeral litter, and she didn't know why he would have been any different.

After a long moment, she wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her gown and wandered through the house in a listless daze and not quite knowing why, but that she didn't know what else to do. He was not there, after all. Isabela was not creeping back out the door after a night's scintillating pleasure, and Fenris did not lurk in the kitchen with a mug of tea to greet her. No, it seemed as it had been for long, painful months: Marisol was quite thoroughly alone in that house but for the motley assortment of a dwarf, his ward, and a freed elven slave, none of whom had risen as yet. She sighed deeply, the emptiness of the foyer settling into her bones and her heart. Then she came to stand at the glass doors leading to the small inner courtyard, and a lump formed in her throat as she gazed outside.

He knelt on the smooth stones in back of the little garden, beneath the iron-wrought arbor and trellis, among fragrant summer blossoms damp with morning dew and the evening rain. Bathed by the light of the rising sun, his head was bowed in silent prayer and contemplation, and he was beautiful. Could Sebastian Vael have ever been anything less?

Marisol wanted to laugh at herself then, at her own maudlin, self-absorbed stupidity, that it had not even occurred to her that he might not have gone from the house again, and instead might have been performing his morning devotions at first light, the way he had for years, for as long as she'd known him. Why would it have occurred to her, though? He was an oathbreaker, by his own words. He'd chosen to kneel at her altar rather than Andraste's, and was damned for it. Then again, he hadn't stopped his daily rites the first time he'd defied his vows to seek vengeance for his family's murder, or so Elthina had said. Marisol took a small comfort in the fact that the grand cleric had been just as baffled by it as her. Small comforts were hard to come by, with the old _madre_ who despised her, and the fact that the enigma of Sebastian Vael was just as unsolvable to her lent a bit of sweetness to her torment. Marisol always took what she could get.

But he'd returned, as he'd promised. The night hadn't been a dream, and he was not gone from her. Sebastian came back, and now he was praying in the very same garden where his final unbreakable vow shattered the night before, in a torrent of kisses on wet grass, with very different prayers whispered upon Marisol's tawny skin. She slipped quietly through the doors to the courtyard, and watched him silently, wondering what it was that he sought from the Maker. Maybe he prayed for forgiveness; maybe for her, the apostate who led him astray, and he, the disgraced brother who, caught between the call of the sacred and that of the profane, finally chose the latter.

She wondered if he hated her. She would have, in his place. But she always hated herself--why wouldn't she, when she did nothing right, when everyone around her came to harm sooner or later, and she was the cause of so much pain for so many people she claimed to care for? Mother's ashes lay on the mantle, Father's defiled by darkspawn, and her only siblings sentenced to a life of grim servitude with the Grey Wardens. Everyone ended up in the void sooner or later because of her. At least Sebastian would have plenty of company. Maybe they might even have a party--she wondered then if there was _caffé_ in the void, and thought it would probably be Orlesian and not Antivan, because, well. It was the void.

A lump formed in Marisol's throat as she gazed at him, consumed by this morbid humor. Her sunlit prince was dressed in white, a contrast to the coral-hued dahlias and violet hydrangeas around him, and she was overcome by shame that she still found him so heartstoppingly beautiful when he prayed. It was a vulgar thing, gawking at him like that, when she was the reason he needed to pray, and when she was the reason he needed to beg Andraste's forgiveness, for betraying her in the name of a tattooed apostate who danced on the tables of brothels, and drank too much with vagabonds, and tumbled with a raider in the shadowy corner of a tavern, and wept for the qunari who ordered her city put to the torch. She, who took from Sebastian what little he had left, who cost him whatever peace and assurance he had left in his heart, and cost him the one person who cared for him when no one else did, not even his own kin, and had loved him like a son.

She bit her lip against the tears that were forming again, swallowed hard, and turned to go back in the house. She had no right to intrude on this. Not after last night, after she caused him to fall from hard won grace for the final time, with no hope of returning to it.

"Please don't go, Mari."

She halted in mid-turn at the quiet sound of his voice; in the periphery of her tear-blurred vision she saw him rise to his feet, but she quickly averted her eyes from him. "I'm so sorry," she said, nearly choking on the words as she wrapped her bare arms about her belly, trembling half from the cool breeze of early morning, and half from her own shame.

"Whatever for?" Sebastian asked, with a softly pleading note in his voice.

Even Marisol didn't know how to answer that question. All the cleverness her mother detested in her had deserted her at last, and her smart mouth fell silent. How precisely does one apologize to a man for ruining his life? She dared to look back at him, and he was standing all aglow, in a tunic of muslin belted at the waist and loose breeches, simple clothing but exquisitely well-tailored as all his clothing was. He held a blossom of Andraste's grace in his hands, its green stem pressed against his fingers, and the irony did make her laugh a little, despairingly. When he caught her gaze with his resplendent blue eyes, the smile that spread across his full lips was brighter and more beautiful than the sun that shone on him. There was a serenity in him that she had never seen before, not even when he sang the chant at service in the sanctuary. He was positively radiant, and she grew weak in the knees at the sight of him, for not the first time, but never had he been so beautiful to her as then. Not even when his face hovered over her own the night before, with his eyes shut in repose as he lost himself in her.

He crossed the short distance between them, and tucked the flower in her disheveled hair, still smiling. She felt his hands on her shoulders, lightly squeezing them, the silk of her dressing gown scrunching against her skin in his grip. She knew that she must have looked a mess, her wealth of golden hair tangled, rouge smeared across her cheeks, kohl streaking down her face with the tears she couldn't hold back, but he didn't seem to care.

"There's no need to weep, Marisol," he told her, wiping the mess from her face with his sleeve, not caring in the slightest that the fine embroidery of his hem stained itself wet grey and pink with the last of her cosmetics.

"Why?" she whispered, and it was a small word, filled with so many questions, so many insecurities.

Sebastian released her, then gently took her round face into his hands. Though his fingers were calloused from years of pulling at bowstrings, his palms were warm and smooth and his touch as achingly soft as it had always been. When he spoke again in his lilting brogue, his breath was warm against her cheeks, and her knees turned to quicksand. "This is my choice, love," he said, brushing his thumbs along her jawline. "And I regret nothing. Not a single moment."

"But--"

"Nothing," he repeated then, more firmly, tracing her bottom lip with a single fingertip. He leaned down, tilting his head, and his mouth followed, soft lips pressed tenderly against her own. 

" _Ah, mi cariño,"_ she cried softly, reverting to Antivan as she always did when her heart swelled overcome with emotion, and clung tightly to him.

"I love you," he breathed as he held her in his arms. "I would not be here if I didn't. And you've not done anything that requires my forgiveness, or anyone else's for that matter."

"Not even Andraste?" Marisol asked in a small voice.

"My vow to her was long broken before last night, if I'm to be truthful with myself," Sebastian began, "but I'll not see you weeping over it. I'm not a lamb to be led astray, and you're no temptress holding a crook. I'm a grown man, and my will is my own, as are my faults. My sins against Holy Andraste and the Maker are my own to bear, as is the price for them. I've already paid it, and I've no regrets for that either." 

She clung to him a little tighter then. "Are you sure of that, Sebastian?"

"As sure as the sun rises in the east," he replied.

"And what of your _madre_?" she protested.

"It's settled between us," Sebastian replied. "I've been released from my service to the Chantry, by my own recognizance. I can't remain there in good conscience, having forsaken my vows. I'll not make a mockery of them. But Elthina has been a mother to me, and the promise between us stands, regardless of my actions. I'll not abandon her to face the intrigues of this city on her own any more than I would abandon you to such a fate. Anything more than that, you need not concern yourself with--or blame yourself for. It's done."

Marisol sighed deeply. So that was it. "A Chantry brother defrocked on account of my defrocking him. Lovely! Mother would be so proud," she muttered with a despairing little laugh.

"Mari," Sebastian chided her gently. "As I said, I've made my choice, and I've no regrets. Allow me that much. My guilt is my own, and I would bear it a thousand times over, if it meant I would be with you. But if you're of a mind that I should leave, I'll not stay where I'm not welcome. I've coin enough to find lodging elsewhere."

"No!" she blurted out, and her voice raised an octave in a little unintended desperation. She tried to swallow it down, for all the good it did her. His embrace was too warm and she was too entirely lonely. Even the thought of him leaving was enough to make her tear up again.

She was so besotted with him, she almost didn't laugh at the absurdity of it all: a disgraced Chantry brother, a Prince of Starkhaven, living in perdition with her, a refugee apostate of Antivan blood and Fereldan birth who'd somehow--somehow!--been named Champion of Kirkwall.

Well, Marisol Hawke was a rather absurd kind of woman when all was said and done, and so she laughed anyway, softly chuckling into his cheek. It was that, or cry again. But the laughter turned bitter in short order, as it sometimes did, and too often of late, and turned to crying anyway. She clung to him, sobbing now for reasons even she did not entirely understand.

"Mari?" His tone was thoroughly puzzled.

"I'm sorry," she whimpered into his ear, apologizing for what seemed like the thousandth time, and for reasons even she didn't know at that point.

Sebastian let his arms fall from her, pulling away just enough to raise his hands back to her tear-stained face. "You've been through so much in the past year alone--you've carried grief enough for the world, and you'd add my guilt to the burden you shoulder no matter how I tell you not to. Please, let me take care of you. If you won't believe me by my words, then let my deeds be the proof of my intention, and my feelings."

"As long as it doesn't involve a sheaf of wheat or a bunch of goats," she mumbled.

"I beg your pardon?"

"Never mind," Mari sighed.

He kissed her brow, and it filled her with warmth. "Come, let's go inside and I'll draw you a bath."

Marisol pursed her lips and quirked her eyebrows at him. "Are you implying that I stink, messere Vael?"

"Of course not," Sebastian said gently. "But it'll do you some good to relax and ease your mind. Have you never been properly attended in the bath chamber?"

That time, when Marisol laughed, it was genuine. His blithe cluelessness was so charming sometimes. "Not all of us have been born to a noble's wealth and privilege, _mi principe_ , even if our names once swam in them. In Ferelden my 'bath chamber' consisted of a tiny wooden tub that leaked, and my only attendant was my mother. Well, and sometimes the dog. Biscuit always was a helper."

Sebastian laughed himself, and hugged her tightly. "Well, then I shall endeavor to match his high standards of service. It's the least the lady of the house deserves."

She smiled as he pulled away from her, and led her back inside the house with a gentle hand. Orana had risen by then and began her morning chores; she hastened an awkward curtsey in greeting as they passed to go upstairs, and quickly fixed her eyes back on the floor she was furiously sweeping. Marisol stayed her laughter out of pity for the poor girl. She only wondered what was going through her mind, seeing a man she knew as a brother of the chantry leading her lady employer by the hand to the bedroom.

That was going to be an entertaining conversation, Marisol thought as she opened the narrow door in her room, explaining her new tenant to the others.


	2. Chapter 2

The bath chamber off the master bedroom was small but quite luxurious by the leaky wooden tub standards of Marisol's childhood, even in relatively cosmopolitan Amaranthine. It was all rich, dark woods like the rest of the manor, with a vanity and a number of little tables covered in vases of fresh flowers from the garden and votive candles in little glass globes, along with pots of her cosmetics and toiletries. The focal point of the small room was a large stone tub which Bodahn identified rather excitedly as volcanic limestone. Mother had said it was imported all the way from Orlais, and cost her grandfather a small fortune, but they were all the rage in Hightown. It was certainly lovely enough, but the most important thing to Marisol was that it was big enough for her to stretch out in, which was no mean feat for a woman of her tall stature. Sebastian kissed her temple, and went back down to the cistern to begin drawing and heating the water.

"Stay here. Today's a day for spoiling you," he said with a smile, before leaving.

She had to admit that the prospect of it was something that set her pulse to racing a little quicker. Oh, she'd joked about it in her usual way, but as always there was a great deal of truth in her jesting. Marisol had never been doted on in such a way, not ever. Her mother bathed her as a child, certainly, but it was a matter of sheer practicality, not luxury. When the twins were born, she was expected to do the same for them, and scrubbed them from head to toe--Carver most of all, as filthy as little boys frequently were--until Lothering, when they were old enough to be embarrassed by such a thing. But it was also true that there was no spoiling reserved for Marisol, not ever, in anything. Whenever there was doting in anything at all, it was for Bethany only, and Marisol was a little ashamed of how it still rankled her, even as a grown adult. Did anyone ever spoil a mule, truly? As the eldest, Marisol only had duty to look forward to at home, and not spoiling.

Especially after Father died.

For a self-declared oathbreaker, Sebastian really was a man of his word though, when it came down to it. Marisol sat on a cushioned stool and watched him go back and forth, lugging pail after pail of steaming water into the bath, and every time she tried to get up to help, he gently--but firmly--sat her back down.

"In the palace in Starkhaven, you know," he remarked after the final trip brought the tub to near full, "we have golden pipes in the baths that draw the water right into the basins. It's a Tevinter invention."

"But do they have lovely princes there to attend you?" Marisol teased him.

Sebastian smiled at her, quirking his eyebrow. "For a lovely princess, perhaps."

Marisol's eyes widened, and she was stunned into speechlessness, as he crossed the space between them to stand behind her, and placed his hands on her shoulders. "You laughed and jested, but you don't think you're worth it, do you? That's what all this guilt is about. You don't believe I'm here because I want to be, because you don't think you're worth the choice," he said. "You wanted me, and now you have me, and now you're afraid of what it means."

She swallowed hard, but remained silent; his words cut her to the core with their truth. Was she truly that predictable, or did he simply know her that well after so long?

He wrapped his arms around her, embracing her tightly from behind. "I'll say it again, and I'll say it plain: I love you, Marisol Hawke. You've severed me from nothing. You've not caused me to fall, and you've not stolen me from anywhere I belong. This is where I belong, and I'm here of my own free will. This is where I want to be. Here, with you. Is that what you want?"

She shut her eyes, taking comfort in his scent, myrrh and leather and clove. "More than anything. I love you too, Sebastian," she whispered.

"Then I am yours," Sebastian said softly. "And the day is ours. Whatever you ask of me, whatever you need from me--I'll give it with all that I am. I want to make you as happy as you make me."

"Well, then. I suppose you'd better get to pampering me then, hmm?" Marisol said with a light giggle. She pulled away from his warmth reluctantly, to shut the door to the bedroom behind them. But before she moved to the tub, she paused at the vanity. She concentrated for a moment, gathering the flows of mana within her, and with a whispered incantation lightly echoing of power, a gentle ripple of energy eased out from her fingertips, setting all the votives aglow in soft flame.

Sebastian gazed at her with not a small amount of awe, when she turned to face him, his deep olive skin gleaming in the candlelight. Her heart nearly stopped at how beautiful he was. "That's a neat trick. It would have come in handy, when I had to light all those the altar candles," he mused.

"I'm full of neat tricks," Marisol said wryly, flashing him a dimpled smile. He blushed then, grinning like a cat who'd just gotten into the cream.

"So I've discovered," he said. She returned his grin with a rather wicked one of her own and fixed her eyes upon his, never leaving his gaze as she raised her hands to her shoulders, grasping the silk of her gown, slipping it down past her shoulder to reveal the heart shaped script inked into it. Before it could drop further, however, Sebastian reached out to her.

"May I?" he asked, the politeness in his tone a marked contrast to the naked hunger in his piercing blue eyes; it sent a shiver down her spine, the way he looked at her as though he were a man starving to death.

"Of course," she replied, her smile brighter. He slid the fabric down her arms and the length of her body, slowly sinking before her to his knees as he disrobed her, and it warmed her heart with amusement to watch his curious eyes trace the myriad colorful designs etched into her brown skin. She felt a sharp pang of disappointment however, when unlike the previous night, his tongue did not follow. But he remained there kneeling before her, gazing up at her in adoration when the garment dropped to the floor at last in a circle around her ankles, and Marisol's mouth grew dry.

She wanted him desperately to get in the tub with her, or to carry her back into the bedroom--to ravish her the way he did the night before, but the famously clever and silver-tongued Marisol found herself at a loss for words, trembling under the power of that gaze, and was quite unable to give voice to her desires. Instead, when Sebastian held out his hand, she grasped it with a playful little squeeze, and allowed him to lead her to the steaming tub, aiding her as she eased down into the water.

It was still hot, though comfortable; enough to flush her brown skin with sweat, but not to scald. Precisely the way she liked her baths. She sank deeper into the water with a little involuntary blissful sigh of pleasure as the welcome heat seeped into her weary bones, and dipped her head back into it to wet her wealth of hair. Already, she felt more relaxed, even though she'd been soaking for not more than a brief moment, and she was so distracted by the sensations of pleasant warmth loosening her muscles that she only scarcely noticed Sebastian cross behind her. He gathered the small brass box from the vanity which held her fragrant soaps and scented oils, along with her favorite brush and comb; they were carved from ivory, a gift from Isabela surely plundered from some merchant vessel or another, though Marisol didn't ask. She always found it better not to ask, with gifts from Isabela.

Marisol sighed then, and cursed herself for wanting to cry again for what seemed like the hundredth time that morning, at the thought of her beloved pirate, and where she might be. Things were going too well to dwell on such maudlin thoughts, but the emptiness she felt without her threatened to overwhelm her again. She wondered what Isabela might think of this, how she would laugh and laugh and make the worst sort of bawdy jokes, enough to make Marisol blush to her core. If there were a single person in the world who would die of amusement from this, from the idea of Marisol Hawke and Sebastian Vael, it would be her, Marisol thought.

And she dearly wished Isabela were here with them, leaning back into her arms, and mercilessly teasing Sebastian with her.

"Sometimes you brood even more than Fenris, you know," Sebastian remarked idly, as he knelt behind the tub, and emptied a small decanter into the warm water; the scent of Nevarran musk bloomed in the air and filled her senses, rich and earthy, and her mood almost instantly lightened.

"Maybe it's contagious," Marisol chuckled, even as she rested her head back against the limestone rim and tried not to think of him, too; then she would really start crying again. Instead, she let the scent of the oil envelop her, and shut her eyes for a moment to take a deep and calming breath, inhaling the fragrance. Sebastian held her chin in one hand, and with the other dipped a small white washing cloth into the water. Then, with achingly soft strokes, he cleansed her cheeks of dried tears and faded kohl and carmine, and the steam from the fabric was so warm and soothing against her skin as he gently massaged her face. She breathed long through her nostrils, savoring his caresses, her eyelashes fluttering involuntarily.

"You're so beautiful, Mari," he said almost reverently, and stooped to kiss her hairline.

"Mmm, I know. But it's sweet of you to keep saying it. I like that," Marisol said. The sound of Sebastian's laughter filled her ears, light and sultry, and it did as much to relax her as his touch. It was why she loved to make him laugh at all.

"Then I suppose I'll have to keep saying it then, won't I?" he said. He brought the cloth down along her jawline, down to her throat, and Marisol could not help but moan a little when he spread his hand upon it, his fingertips curled around the fabric and her skin in equal measure; there was no pressure at all, but it was enough to set Marisol's blood racing, her pulse quickening as the darker fantasies that lurked inside her mind rose up again. A wild sudden hope came unbidden to her mind, that he would clamp down on her throat, and it was followed just as quick by a pang of shame. But he paused only briefly to rest his hand there, his expression something of a enigma in the golden candlelight as he stared down at her, taking the measure of what had occurred. But to her astonishment, there was no judgment in his eyes, no condemnation. Only curiosity. It put her at ease far more than even she expected, having tried her best to hide that part of herself in their first encounter the night before, for fear of frightening him away in such an intense moment.

When he was finished, she reached up out of the water to steal the cloth from his hand, and then brought his fingers to her lips, gently suckling them each in turn.

"That's terribly distracting, love," Sebastian murmured, but Marisol noted rather smugly that he did not exactly try to pull his hand away. She let go of him with a naughty little giggle, then stretched out like a lazy cat in the water.

He took a knot of soap in his hands from the box--she caught the scent of lavender, cutting through the musk of the fragrant water--and lathered it vigorously in his wet hands, before setting to work on her hair. He took just as much care in this as he did washing her face, working his fingers in firm little circles upon her scalp, and Marisol closed her eyes to lose herself in the solace of his massaging hands. He scooped the water up and let it cascade down through his hands to rinse out the soap, over and over again, before gathering her hair into a thick cable of honeyed gold in his hands and twisting it in his grasp to ring it out. She bit her lower lip at the sensation of it coiled taut around his hands, stifling another little whimper. She could feel the gooseflesh rise on her arms, as she rose up a little to sit upright once more, her back propped against the limestone, her head leaning into his grip.

Marisol was rather disappointed when he loosened it, but then she felt the comb in her hair, and smiled. If she had never had anyone to spoil her in the bath, it was nearly as rare that someone combed her hair. It was thick even when wet, and waved up considerably in texture, as a mark of the Amells' Rivaini heritage. But Sebastian was gentle as he coaxed the tangles out, working from end to root as though he were born to the task. The blonde coloring, however, was assuredly not Rivaini, nor was it naturally Antivan, but rather a mark of a vain adolescent mage with too much skill at glamours.

"Why do you never leave it as it is?" Sebastian asked her, when he poured thick oil of coconut out on his hands from a decanter, and began slicking it into her waves, running his fingers through to her scalp again and again. The scent of it was almost cloyingly sweet to her senses, that oil from the Rivaini merchant, but blended in a surprising harmony of fragrance with the musk. It was rich and so relaxing to take it in, while Sebastian's fingers worked it into her thick hair.

"Hmm?" Marisol mumbled, her eyes shut in blissful obliviousness to his question.

"Your hair. It's beautiful, don't misunderstand my meaning. But it was just as lovely when you were in mourning and kept it dark," he replied.

Marisol laughed a bit sheepishly, with her eyes still shut. "Oh, that. Well, Lothering was only big enough for one ravishing dark-haired Antivan beauty, you see, and I graciously gave Bethany the honor out of the kindness of my heart. Don't say I never loved my sister," she said.

"Ah," Sebastian said, in an amused tone. "But you're no longer in Lothering."

"I suppose I just got used to it, it became something I was known for. And Father loved to make terrible puns about it. My name means 'sun and sea', you know, in Antivan. He was forever making bad jokes."

"A Hawke making bad jokes. How remarkable," Sebastian marveled sarcastically.

She playfully splashed water at him over her shoulders, with a flick of her wrists in rebuke. "Shh. More spoiling, less sass."

"As you wish, my lady," he said with a small laugh. She felt the comb slip through her thoroughly oiled hair over and over again, and then he draped it in a thick cord over the front of her shoulder. He'd poured more oil out into his hands, because she felt them slick and strong against her shoulders, working his fingers and palms with firm pressure into her inked skin. Marisol had no idea how much tension she'd been carrying in her muscles until he massaged it out. Tendons coiled like springs beneath her skin loosened with ease under his practiced hands; she even felt several things popping rather pleasantly.

She also had no idea how positively sensual his touch could be until then. She'd only had an inkling of it in their first encounter, but it'd been subsumed by the sheer ferocity of the passion he'd unleashed after so long spent repressing it. Not on this lazy morning in the bath, however. He was slow and deliberate in the way he touched her now, massaging and caressing by turns. He kissed the nape of her neck as his hands slowly slipped down her shoulders, up and down her neck, sliding around her collarbone, and creeping down achingly close to her breasts; his fingers skimmed the top of the soft curves, swirling teasing circles against her dark skin, but went no further than that, and it was maddening. He set her heart to racing and her body tingling, and she craved his touch like nothing else in that moment, arching into it, and the soft little kisses he planted along her shoulders.

"I want you, Sebastian," she said, her tone softly pleading in heightened arousal. "Right here in the bath."

"Then you shall have me," Sebastian said, and planted a final kiss on her shoulder before rising to his feet. He emerged from behind the tub to stand beside it, with his sleeves rolled up to the elbows, hands glistening with oil as they gripped the hem of his tunic, and lifted and pulled it over his head before her eyes with a deliberate slowness. Marisol lifted her hands from the water and tugged at the laces of his breeches, unraveling the knots until he slid out of them entirely. Her lips curled into a wicked smile; the extent of his own arousal was abundantly clear, hardened to attention against his belly. She truly made no attempt to hide her shameless ogling of him, openly letting her hungry eyes drift up and down his lean body, taking in every muscle and curve of his athletic physique, following the light sweep of chestnut brown hair on his chest, trailing down his abdomen. She traced the line of his broad hips and the disappearing delicious curve behind him, so shapely. His olive complexion always grew deeper with the sun in the summer months, turning a rich coppery bronze nearly as dark as her own, and it gleamed golden in the candlelight of the bath chamber. Marisol almost wanted to weep at how beautiful he was, towering over her bath, gazing down at her with unmistakable yearning.

" _Mi príncipe bello,"_ she said a bit breathlessly, shifting forward in the tub carefully.

Her beautiful prince smiled, much like a cat that just got into the cream, and slipped into the tub behind her, sinking down into the water. He leaned back with her then, pulling her into a warm, wet embrace from behind. She rested back against him, stretching out her long legs while sprawling between his thick and muscled thighs.

"I should have gotten a bath attendant sooner," she said a bit dreamily, as he caressed her arms. "I could get used to this."

"But I haven't even begun to serve you, my lady," he said, nuzzling her hair, and there was the slightest hint of an edge to his tone that made her smile wickedly. Marisol very much liked this new side to Sebastian. He'd always been something of a flirt, in his own subtle way, enough to remind her that he hadn't always been a pious brother. But she could always sense there was a part of him that held something back, almost as if he were afraid; and of himself it seemed, far more than he was of her.

That fear was gone though, now, in the bantering he made with her. In its place there was a boldness that excited her, and it was a boldness echoed in the way he touched her. How someone who spent so many years in the chantry could have such a sensual touch was still remarkable to her--but again, he had not always been there, and it was evident to her in his every move. Indeed, he seemed quite determined to remind her that he was no blushing chantry boy. There was another distinct reminder pressed hard against her lower back, swollen stiff and warm with his ache for her.

Marisol was not at all complaining. She remembered last night, every inch of him--as well she should, because there were quite a few inches. That she did not complain about, either. She'd once been lover to a qunari, after all.

"I didn't think it possible to go mad from want, until I met you," he said, as hands trembling faintly with desire wandered along the length of her body. "And you're my heart's desire, as much as my body's."

"Well, you know me. I aim to please--" Marisol quipped, but her next clever remark was stopped dead in its tracks, caught in her throat in a delighted sigh of pleasure as his oil-slickened hand slid with agonizing slowness up her breast to cup it, squeezing it lightly in his grasp. His thumb ghosted over her nipple, large and black, and he caught it between his fingers, teasing it to hardness with the slightest hint of pressure.

"As do I," Sebastian breathed into her ear, the melodic brogue of his voice low and thick with lust. She might well careen over the edge just by the sound of it. "Is this terribly pleasing to you, love?"

The only response Marisol was possibly capable of giving was a plaintive whimper as she squirmed back against him, and it was all the encouragement he needed to echo the motion with his other hand. Her head rolled back in pleasure, and she trembled in his grasp, firm hands cupping and squeezing her, kneading her pliant flesh. Sebastian wasted no time taking advantage of the greater access he'd been given, and she felt his tongue glide across her neck, tracing her lily tattoo; his teeth followed, nipping lightly at her flushed skin even as he continued to fondle her, and it sent shivers of pleasure down her spine. The growing ache between her thighs throbbed in time to her racing pulse, and she felt herself grow slick and hot even sitting inside the warm water of the tub. It was nearly unbearable, and she squeezed her thighs together, squirming harder against him.

"Sebastian." His name drew out of her in a soft, yearning moan when he pinched her nipples in tandem. He licked his way across her neck to her ear, and caught the lobe with his teeth.

"I want to pleasure you in every way you desire," he breathed into her ear, squeezing her harder then in emphasis. "What do you want, Mari?"

"Your fingers, _mi cariño,_ " she pleaded. "I didn't invite you into my bath for tea."

He kissed her neck hungrily in reply, and his hands drifted down her belly, calloused archer's fingers kneading her skin as they did, gliding down the curves of her wide hips. She opened her legs to him in shameless, desperate invitation. It was absolutely maddening how measured his pace was, first toying with the soft, dark curls resting on her mound, then stroking her inner thighs with teasing caresses. His thumbs brushed against her nether lips, and her hips jerked up, desperate for friction.

Marisol moaned softly when at last Sebastian's fingers parted her swollen flesh, and he began to caress her, drawing lazy circles with a slickened finger up and down her folds. His breath was hot and heavy on her neck, and his other hand rose up and down her belly, until it reached up to play once more with her breasts.

"You have the most beautiful body I've ever seen," he whispered to her, as he teased her sensitive flesh and bit her ear. "Every inch of you is perfect."

She gasped in delight when she felt him caress her swollen clit, stroking it at first with feather light touches that hardened into firm circles, and she began rolling her hips, grinding into his touch with a slow, hard rhythm that sent the water to making soft waves in the tub. It was the most delicious, wonderful friction, building pressure and tension with every stroke of his fingers; he increased his pace, rubbing in faster circles, and teased at her swollen entrance with another finger. It was the deftest of touches to drive her mad, as practiced as Isabela's.

When he spoke to her again, it was in Antivan, and his accented brogue made her even wetter. "It's a shame I can't taste your juices in here. You were so sweet last night, it nearly drove me mad."

Had she been of a mind, she'd have asked him exactly how he learned such vulgar speech, but she had far more important things on her mind at present. "Fuck me," she whispered instead, with a shameless hunger.

With the smoothest grace, his longest finger plunged into her to the knuckle, even as his thumb continued rubbing her clit, losing none of his pace, and she moaned in pleasure. She was hot like a cauldron and grinded into his hand, the water churning harder around them as her hips bucked into his strokes. A second finger followed, firm and deep, and she shut her eyes, oblivious to everything but his fingers working her inside and out, and his fierce kisses against her neck, tongue swirling in counterpoint to his hand's firm rhythms between her thighs.

"My precious Mari," he whispered, biting at her ear again.

He pumped his fingers inside her for all they were worth, her quivering flesh caught in the pincer grip of his hand; he hooked his fingers inside her then, finding her most sensitive inner flesh, and she cried out at his stroking, the pressure within her building even higher to a crescendo.

"Come for me, love," Sebastian moaned into her ear, and when his fingers curled within her, when his thumb pressed hard against her throbbing clit, Marisol obliged him: she jerked down hard against him, her back arching against him, bent like his bow. She cried out loud and incoherently as a wave of pleasure slammed into her, cascading across her entire body down to her curling toes, and when it passed, she melted back against his chest, into the curve of his arm around her, lightheaded and panting. She rested her face beside his, nuzzling his cheek, and she felt his lips against her sweat-soaked brow.

"Good girl," he said, after he kissed her, and she grew warm.

"Like I said: I aim to please," Marisol said with a tired giggle, and a quick flash of her dimples. Sebastian laughed with soft affection; he slipped his fingers out and rested them against her, lightly cupping her soft mound of hair, but toyed gently with her still, and she trembled with the aftershocks he coaxed from her with his now idle strokes.

"As do I," he said, and kissed her again. "Did I please you well, love?"

Marisol smiled, and gasped a little when a finger slipped between her quivering folds in just a way to send a shiver down her spine. She chuckled then, and her lips found his jaw. "Oh, I'm not sure. Maybe you should please me a few more times. Just to be sure," she replied.

"A day spent in pleasure with you is time well spent," Sebastian sighed contentedly. "And I aim to take my fill of it, if that's alright by you."

"Take whatever you want. I'm a giver," Marisol drawled, quirking her thick eyebrows even as she playfully wiggled her ass against him; he was still hard against her, and she hadn't forgotten it. She reached down and beneath her, finding his cock with her hand, and marveled a bit at just how hard he was.

"Ah, Mari," Sebastian gasped, and she watched his eyelids grow heavy, his lips part. "I'm afraid we might make a mess of your bath chamber, if I took you here in the tub. And the water's growing cold."

Marisol braced against the stone arms of the tub, slowly easing herself up out of the now lukewarm water. "So take me to bed. And then…take me," she said with a cheeky grin. He laughed at her dreadful turn of phrase and followed her out of the bath, reaching for the neatly folded pile of thick linen cloth on the shelf.


	3. Chapter 3

Freshly toweled, Sebastian carried Marisol out of the bathing chamber and into the bedroom, laying her gently down upon the massive bed. She smiled at him, flipping her damp hair playfully as she sank flat on her back into the pillows, and he slithered atop her, hungrily parting her lips with his tongue for an impassioned kiss. Though his blood was certainly hot, he was no clumsy adolescent boy going straight for the prize, as it were. With agile fingers and an eager mouth, he traced every swirling line of ink etched into her warm, golden skin, kissing a flower here, a feather there. She moaned softly when his lips came down upon her nipples, suckling them by turns, grazing with the faintest hint of teeth. His hands wandered down her stomach, with the hot breath of his kisses to follow, finding every sensitive spot on her body, and Marisol was just as ready for his tender mercies as in the bath, aching and wet.

He nuzzled her with his nose, his tongue slipping between her wet folds, and he darted it inside them before his lips pursed around her swollen clit and he licked and licked, as if he were intoxicated by the very taste of her. Some men played at this halfheartedly, only enough to rouse their lovers to readiness for a good pounding. Marisol never had such misfortune in her limited experience with them, but Isabela complained a great deal about it during their pillow talk. Sebastian was not one of these men, blessedly so, and it was immediately clear to her that he truly enjoyed it as much as she did. Marisol saw his hand drift down to his cock, moving up and down only once, as his tongue lapped up her juices, like a man thirsting in the desert. But he did not simply lap at her, no, and he did not neglect her pleasure in favor of his own. Sebastian made love to her with his tongue and his lips and even his teeth, nipping gently, his breath hot against her. He reached up with that idle hand, the one he'd been stroking himself with, and spread her with his fingers, massaging her, and her eyes rolled back in her head as he suckled her clit.

Her hands clenched the bedsheets and she wrapped her long legs around his head, shutting her eyes to lose herself in the sensation of his warm, moist tongue licking her clit over and over again in a steady, pulsing rhythm. She moaned and gasped, rolling her hips to match his rhythm, to feel that blessed friction that much harder against her. His pace was maddening at first, inducing a slow burn of pleasure aided by his teasing circles away from her clit, only to return that much firmer and faster. And went on for what seemed like a blissful eternity, until it reached a crescendo and Marisol's fingers curled tightly in the sheets with her toes. She cried out shuddering hard against him in release and saw spots behind her eyes, but he pressed on even as she panted his name. His hands gripped her haunches even tighter, and paid no heed to the quivering of her sensitive flesh, licking and suckling her until the aftershocks subsided and a renewed wave of pleasure washed over her.

When Sebastian's head lifted, from between her legs, his pouting lips and chin smeared as though he just eaten an overripe peach, his eyes found hers and they burned brighter than they ever had before.

"Marisol." Her name was little more than a quiet rumble from deep inside his belly, as he stared at her in naked, unabashed hunger. Lightheaded and tingling all over, she trembled at the ferocity of it; still trembling with mild quivers of pleasure, she realized she still was not sated, not when she remembered how he felt inside her the night before, when last he looked at her that way.

She could not deny him, though she was certain he would need a certain kind of assistance, licked clean and throbbing as she was in the aftermath of two rapid orgasms. Marisol would have resorted to the usual minor incantation, but even that level of concentration was quite beyond her reach at the moment, and so she rolled over instead to open the nightstand beside her bed. She reached in the drawer and pulled out a small glass decanter full of clear oil. A warming cantrip, she could manage. Her fingers brushed the glass and she whispered a quick chant, energy flowing from her fingertips to engulf the tiny vessel until it grew slightly warm to the touch.

"Here," she breathed softly, holding it out to him, and beckoning to him with her other hand. "Let me."

Sebastian obliged, crawling up the bed, and straddled her thighs, resting back on his haunches, but never taking his eyes from her. She reached up, still laying down, and poured the warm oil into a cupped hand before replacing the stopper and tossing it out of the way. But she relaxed her fingers, uncoiling them, and let the oil drip down between them onto his cock, then worked her slippery hand up and down his shaft. He groaned and twitched in her hand as it twisted, oiling him well, his hands gripping her soft curves. It was so unbelievably warm when he rubbed his hard shaft between her nether lips, guiding the tip with his hand in circles against her clit. Marisol shivered, twitching, but pushed through her hypersensitivity until all she felt was pleasure rippling through her, her arousal renewed, and she gently fingered herself until she grew slick again. She opened her legs wide when she was, but to her surprise, Sebastian gently shifted her over onto her side, until she was half sprawled upon it and her stomach, and he slipped behind her.

Marisol thought she might cry in anticipation. Instead she cried in pleasure, softly, when he edged his broad tip between her folds, teasing her entrance for a moment before easing his way in, inch by rock hard inch. He held her by the curve of her hip, and began to thrust as gently as he could, taking his time quite deliberately, until he sheathed himself in her to the hilt. He remained still for a moment, and he held her, his breaths heavy and hot to her ear.

"Am I hurting you, love?" Sebastian asked her. The feeling of him inside her was like nothing else; a certain qunari, perhaps, but _he_ made her dance the edge between pleasure and pain quite a bit more sharply than her prince, being considerably larger. There was a still a tinge of pain to the way Sebastian filled her, yes, but it enflamed her in a way she could not describe. To think, Isabela once joked and called her a size queen when the smaller toys in her arsenal would not satisfy her. Marisol could not deny it, though, how good it felt to strain with such girth.

"Yes," she whimpered, throbbing around him.

"Do you wish for me to stop?" His tone was deathly serious, with no trace of light mockery or seductive ire.

"Please don't," Marisol sighed in response, squeezing his hand, drawing it down from her hip to curl around her inner thigh, to rub her once again.

And so he rode her. Achingly slow, at first, letting the oil do its work to ease his passage, and Marisol thought she might die of yearning. But with each sinuous roll of his hips, he thrust a bit harder, until he found an easy, measured rhythm into a slow and deep grind. Time seemed to stand still then, as she closed her eyes and bucked back against him. It was nothing like the night before, with all its fevered urgency, with her face buried in her pillow and him astride her from behind, pounding her into the soft down of her mattress. That sated her quite well, of course, but there was a beauty to this that made Marisol's pulse race faster. Sebastian's hips rolled against her like smooth thunder, his thrusts deep and languid but no less hard.

He slid his arms under her own and clung to her tightly, his moans punctuated by the staccato sounds of his flesh slapping against hers every time their bodies met, but then his hands slid down to grip her wide hips, as though he were desperate for any kind of leverage. He settled for roughly pulling her by the thigh, and she hooked her leg back against him. With their legs entwined, Sebastian slid even deeper into her than before, gyrating against her, and his other hand slid down to grip her firmly by the throat. All semblance of reason flew out of her mind along with her senses when he did, and she squeezed down hard on her clit, trembling in his grasp. The shudder that followed was primal, pleasure rising up from some deep well within her that only two others had ever touched. She tensed and let out a high-pitched cry of pleasure, white spots floating in her blurred vision as she lost herself for a fourth time, and the most intense that morning.

Sebastian could hold out no longer, and his seemingly infinite patience reached its end as soon as she orgasmed. He went careening over the edge after her, his entire body pulled taut like his bowstring, and his teeth clamped down hard onto her shoulder as he let out a long, languorous groan of pleasure, when his seed shot into her.

It was a long, long time before either of them had the sense or wherewithal to speak. They lay together in silence, Sebastian limp and sated within her, with his brow resting against her hair. She curled up into his arms, neither wanting to let go or able, but then he pulled away from her, rolling onto his back. She turned with him, propping herself up by the elbow, and smiling at how beautiful he was in the afterglow of pleasure, sunlight filtering through her window to illuminate the sweat and oils beaded on his bronze skin. His eyes were closed in contented bliss, and he turned his head to gaze at her fondly.

"I never thought you could be so insatiable, _mi cariño,"_ she said at last. "Though perhaps I should have known. You've always been so passionate about everything, what with your roundhouse kicking of flasks and shooting arrows into the chanter's board."

"I've always had a lustful heart, Mari," Sebastian admitted, with a sheepish and somewhat self-deprecating smile at her teasing. "Of all my vows, it was always the hardest to for me to hold fast to. I took comfort in the Chant, knowing that we all have burdens to carry in this life, and that an all consuming passion was mine. I channeled it as best I could into my faith, and learned temperance and discipline. Temptations came and went, of course. More than once I'd erred, and made atonement."

"…and by erred, you mean…?" Marisol asked, though she suspected the answer.

Sebastian coughed lightly with mild embarrassment. "My cell was at the far end of the hall, and I know how to be quiet if I must. It was that, or keep staining my sheets in the night like I was an adolescent boy again."

Marisol bit down on her lip, half to stifle the laughter rising up in her, and half in flushed, titillation as images swirled in her mind of Sebastian hiking up his crisp chantry robes and wantonly pleasuring himself in a spartan cell in the dark of night, fearful of being caught but too aroused to care. She suddenly wondered how many times he'd done it, and a warm tingle spread between her legs in renewed excitement.

"…did you ever think of me? When you, uh, erred?" Marisol blushed to the tips of her ears when she asked, suddenly bashful for reasons that escaped her.

"Often," he confessed, caressing her cheek. "It's why I felt so unworthy of you. Perhaps it's why I still do, all things considered. If only you knew the things I thought in the dark of night, you might not be so forgiving of an oathbreaker. Much less the things I did, when I succumbed to my weakness."

"We all have our secrets, Sebastian," Marisol said, lightly stroking his flushed skin, and curling her fingers in his chest hair. "Remember that you're talking to an apostate, and one who used to sneak off to the docks at night only to come home raw and bruised in the morning and lie that she'd been gotten into a fight with street thugs, rather than fulfilling the very fervent demands of someone's qun. I'm hardly fit to judge a holy brother for polishing the blessed candlestick, let's be serious."

Sebastian laughed in spite of himself, and his broad smile warmed her heart. "You do make a compelling point," he said. She bent down to kiss him, hot and heavy and soft.

"Tell me everything, _mi amor._ Share with me your most secret shame. I swear I won't think less of you," Marisol said. Her fingers curled against his skin, and her smile somehow turned bashful and wicked at the same time. "I may even love you more. I mean, my secret predilection for deviance should be well established by now."

Sebastian gazed up at her for a long moment, hesitation flickering in his eyes, but then he took a deep breath. "Do you remember a few months back, when we made camp for the night in that cave on the Wounded Coast?"

Marisol remembered it well. Accompanied by Fenris and Isabela, they'd gone in search of a lost qunari patrol, at the Arishok's request, and found nothing but an abomination and shades to be put down. It was by then too late to make the return trip back to the city before nightfall, and so they took shelter in a grotto nearby for the night. It was lovely, with a clear blue pool, and the light of the full moon drifting through rocky crevices. She remembered this well, because Isabela found her alone by that pool after the boys had gone to bed and her mind was in turmoil with what she must report back to the qunari. And when Isabela found her, things went about as one would expect from the two of them in a moonlit grotto. Marisol was Antivan after all, and terribly romantic.

"Yes," she answered him, and it seemed an inadequate word to encapsulate her memories of that night, to recount laying on smooth flat stone cool to the touch with Isabela's warm thighs wrapped around her head and her salty sweetness on her tongue and her soft cries of pleasure echoing off the walls. Marisol felt herself grow near dripping wet with those memories dancing in her head, tinged always with that sense of melancholy tugging at her soul, the weight of her loss heavy in her chest.

"I got up in the night to fill my waterskin and I saw you," Sebastian said, and the sadness ebbed in her then, replaced by a powerful curiosity and no small amount of titillation. Her blood raced in her veins at the very thought that he might have been watching them.

"You saw me and Bela?" Marisol's tone was hushed.

"I did," Sebastian replied. "I went to the pool and I saw you there, sitting on the outcropping, with your skirts hiked up and her kneeling there before you, with your leg on her shoulder. It took every ounce of discipline I had to turn away from it, and I was so ashamed of myself, to intrude on such an intimate moment, gawking like the worst kind of leering degenerate."

Marisol knew from leering degenerates, far too many to be counted in Lothering, and she would never count Sebastian among them even at his worst. She was not repulsed by him either, far the opposite. The pulsing quickened between her legs, an already pleasant memory spiced by the knowledge that she'd been caught, and had no idea for all this time. Her mouth grew terribly dry, in a rather ironic contrast to the situation in her lower regions, and she bit her lip again as her heart pounded. "How long were you there watching?"

"Only a moment, but Maker help me, it was enough to make me sicker with desire than I'd been in years. I stumbled back to my bedroll and tried to sleep, but I just couldn't forget the sight of you no matter how hard I tried. It was seared into my mind like a brand. And the sounds carried too well in that cave. Every time I shut my eyes against those visions, I heard you moaning, and they came back stronger," Sebastian said, his tone quiet and a little distant; Marisol gazed down at him and saw him stir to arousal again, straining thick and hard against his tuft of chestnut curls.

She knew the answer to the question in her mind--it deepened her own arousal, thinking on it--but she asked it anyway, longing to hear it confessed from his own mouth. "What did you do?"

"The only thing that could ever grant me a measure of peace, whenever prayer could not," he replied simply.

"Really? With Fenris right across from you?" Marisol's eyes grew a bit wide. That she'd already known the answer did not mean it failed to amaze her that he'd truly been so brazen. 

Or thrill her, for that matter.

Sebastian turned his face from her then. "I was so gripped by lust that in my depravity I'd hoped he'd catch me at it, and the notion made my blood run hotter. The thought of his beautiful eyes stumbling upon my wickedness only fueled those fires in me rather than quenching them." He swallowed hard before continuing. "Are you still so inclined to think kindly on me, Mari?"

Marisol gently caressed his cheek, turning him back to face her once more, and bent down to part his lips with her tongue, running her fingers through his sweat dampened hair again and again. "You're not the only one who likes to be watched, _mi cariño,"_ she said, trailing kisses along his throat, her lips finding its hollow and pressing firmly into it."But even if Fenris had seen you, I think you'd have been rather surprised. He's kind of into wickedness," she murmured into his skin.

She remembered a different night then, one at Fenris' disheveled manor house, with too much sweet Tevinter wine and a merry fire burning in the hearth, when she danced for him in the Antivan way, her wooden heels muffled against the tattered rug on the floor. She'd fallen asleep, too tired and tipsy from drink to go home, but not so much that she could not remember. Marisol remembered it well, awakening from a fevered dream of him, alone in his bed. His beautiful green eyes glinted softly in the darkness as elven eyes did, gazing up at her from his makeshift nest on the floor. It was curiosity in them, not condemnation, when he watched her hand moving inside her fine leather breeches even as she pretended it was his. They'd never spoken of it, either. Not until that fateful night some weeks ago, when it _was_ his hand, and his lips, and his tongue, and his lyrium painted cock, and then everything fell apart.

Memories of passion seemed destined to be caught up in melancholy, for Marisol, and she felt the pain of his absence for the thousandth time. Like with the pain of Isabela's loss, she forced herself not to dwell on it. She thought instead of the way Fenris liked to stare at Sebastian when he believed no one was looking, with the same curious eyes gleaming with possibility and more than a little hunger. It was much more pleasant to think about, and might have given her even more fevered dreams from time to time.

Even as her mouth explored Sebastian's flushed and tawny skin, she thought back to the cavern, and him pleasuring himself to the sounds of her and Isabela making love to each other. What if Fenris really _had_ seen him do it? If he was that taken by lust, would he even have realized it, if Fenris had? Marisol's mind was rather joyously rolling about in the gutter then, and the ache between her legs throbbed even harder than it did when she was in the bathtub some moments before; she reached down between them then, rubbing herself as she kissed his neck.

"Mari," Sebastian sighed her name deeply, half in bliss at her lips and tongue upon his neck, and half in relief, Marisol thought, at his confession not being held against him.

"Can you show me?" Marisol asked him, even as she began to lightly finger herself.

"Mmm?"

"The way you pleasured yourself then, that night. You wanted to be seen, yes? Well I want to watch you. Isn't that a lucky coincidence? The Maker must be smiling upon you after all."

He smiled, chuckling softly to himself in defeat, as perhaps it finally dawned on him that he was not the only one with hidden passions, and that in this the two of them were well matched. Marisol had been wondering how many more orgasms she'd need to have before that occurred to him.

Well, she was determined, at any rate.

"I suppose I ought to give you a show, then. I did promise to please you however you wanted, and that's one vow even an oathbreaker can keep," he said, then kissed her.

Sebastian lifted his leg to rest a foot on the bed, and reached out for the little glass decanter, pouring more of the warmed oil out onto his hand before discarding it. The slick liquid slipped out between his fingers as he gripped himself, dripping down in rivulets over his knuckles and down the length of his shaft. Slowly, he began stroking himself, hooking the leg that rested on the bed, and sank deeply into the pillows. 

It was one of the most beautiful things Marisol had ever seen. Sebastian's body grew taut as his hand slid up and down the length of his cock, the muscles in his thighs rippled with building tension, and sweat beaded anew upon his brow. He gazed up at her as he did, his eyes half lidded. When he spoke again, it was slow and measured, his lilting brogue thick with undisguised lust. "The sounds you made were exquisite, you know, both of you. I was entranced by them, as surely as if you'd cast a spell. I thought of how they would sound if it were me, with my tongue inside you…and I thought of Isabela, how I would please her so to make such beautiful sounds."

Marisol's hands were trembling as she watched him, dipping her fingers inside herself in a rhythm to match him. "Did you think of him, Sebastian?" she asked. "When you pleasured yourself, did you think of Fenris, the way you thought of Bela and me?" 

"Yes," he moaned by way of confession, gripping himself tighter. She'd long suspected it, of course, his attraction to Fenris. Marisol was not a stupid woman, and Sebastian was not nearly as circumspect as he believed. But it was quite another thing to hear it from his own groaning mouth, to hear a confession she thought she would never hear outside the confines of her own most lurid fantasies. "I thought of the sounds he might make, with my lips suckling him…oh, Maker..."

Sebastian could no longer give words to his fantasies, lost as he was in pleasure, and tugged at himself harder and faster, his hips rolling gracefully into his strokes. It was so beautiful, this passionate yearning he'd kept so buried, and watching him simply let it take him over was magnificent to behold. It wasn't simply that it was thrilling to her senses, though it certainly deepened her own desires. Marisol felt a certain kind of awe and humility, that he'd trusted her enough to let his guard down. Strangely, she was reminded of Fenris in that way, though they could not have been more different in others. It was perhaps somewhat of a blessed relief that she was too aroused to feel the inevitable pang of longing for her estranged lover, and could only focus on watching her current one writhing on her bed as he pleasured himself delirious to thoughts of them.

And it was too much for her in the end to simply bear it with an obscene stare. Her hands reached over and spread across his chest, caressing him slowly, fingers drawing circles around dark nipples that hardened beneath her touch, in an echo of the way he'd touched her in the bath. She bent down and kissed her way down his body, following the treasure trail of soft brown hair, and her hand spread around his fist, moving up and down his cock.

"Is this what you truly wanted, _mi cariño_?" Marisol asked him softly, her fingers slipping between his and lacing together. Her hand stroked him in tandem with his own, even as her other hand rubbed between her dripping folds. "To be seen, and touched like this?" 

"…so long. For so long," Sebastian groaned, between increasingly labored breaths. "Oh, Marisol." He moaned her name like a prayer, as his hips rose up again and again to meet their tandem stroking, and it drove her mad with lust. "…you have no idea..."

"All you had to do was ask," Marisol said, as her nails dug into the muscle of his inner thigh. "That night, or any other. I would have been yours. I'm yours, now."

He made a soft keening sound when her tongue darted down, licking the dewdrop's worth of his seed from the tip of his cock before engulfing it with her thick, pouting lips. She inched him slowly between them, her tongue hot and inviting, edging him down deeper to her throat with every stroke. Before long she'd engulfed him in his entirety, sucking him with abandon to his own lovely sounds of delirium. Marisol fully intended to pay him in kind, for the pleasure his tongue had so graciously provided her; as she said, she was a giver, and it had been far too long since she'd last pleased someone this way.

Anyway, several hours was far too long for Marisol to go without Sebastian in her mouth, after several years of pining for him there. She felt his hand petting her damp hair, trembling against her as he rose up to meet her mouth.

"Come here, love," Sebastian begged her, gasping. "Let me taste you again."

Giver though she was, Marisol did not need to be told twice. She pulled up from him only enough to slither her lower half across the sheets, and lifted a leg to straddle Sebastian's mouth. He licked her from one end to the other, so marvelously hungry for her just as he'd been before, and it drove him to even greater heights of passion than she thought him capable of. His arms coiled about her thick thighs for leverage as he thrust hard into her mouth, as much fucking her as she was licking and suckling him, twisting her hand up and down as she did. It was pure bliss, riding his tongue with her mouth full of him, knowing in every fiber of her being just how much he lusted for her. And it was the most wonderful kind of solace, giving herself over to pleasure as he did, and years of longing fulfilled at last, with no shame or fear, only an equal exchange of beauty and desire. Only love. Only Sebastian, moaning loudly and languorously into her body as though it were the most natural thing in the world, right and true.

And it was.

He grunted into her thigh, tensing beneath her with a series of jerking thrusts when he crested over the edge for the second time that morning; his seed was warm with the heat of his body when it shot into her mouth, and she let it trickle down her throat, milking him to the last drop with her lips. But the taste of his pleasure was too much for her, and she clenched hard on his lips, her cries muffled in her throat by him, and shuddered a final time against his tongue, collapsing upon him in the sweetest kind of exhaustion.

Even if Marisol had anything left within her for him to coax out, she could not have let him, and he could not have done it. Well and truly sated in every way possible, she rolled off him, careful not to hit him with her trembling knees. Sebastian lay for a moment panting to catch his breath, and then leaned over to retrieve the hapless duvet from its unassuming pile on the floor, drawing it up around them both as he curled up with her, holding her in his arms. It was so good. 

Guilt gnawed at her again, for an entirely different reason than before; now it was because Marisol wished desperately that Fenris and Isabela were there with her too. She missed them more than words could say. Not even Sebastian could fill that void in her heart left by them, and perhaps it was cruel of her to think he could. Cruel to all of them, and selfish.

"Mari?" Sebastian asked her.

"I miss them," Marisol sighed. "I want them here with me--with us. Maker's breath, I'm so greedy, I'm sorry."

"I don't think you are," Sebastian said, and she didn't have to tell him who precisely she meant. "You loved them long before you ever knew me. And it's very easy to see why."

"Oh? What do you mean?" she asked.

"That ease you have with one another, that gentle affection. Maker have mercy on my licentious heart, but I coveted it like little else. I repented many times for that, more than I care to think about." 

"Forbidden pleasures in the chantry, a fetish for exhibitionism, and now dreams of orgies swirling around your pretty head. I had no idea you were so kinky, Sebastian," Marisol giggled. Sebastian smiled at her, a bit sadly.

"They've not always been dreams, Mari. There was a good reason I was sent to the Chantry. But you misunderstand me love, if you hear me say these things and think sex was all I wanted from any of you. I wanted…ah, Mari, I wanted to _belong_. I craved affection and companionship. I've wanted it my whole life. It's what I was seeking in the arms of so many men and women when I was young and wild, I came to realize that. And when I came to the Chantry, once the hurt and resentment passed, I found comfort and surety. I'd come home there, and I did belong. I was so happy, Marisol, that I believed I'd found my life's meaning at last. But I did not realize I might want somewhat more than that, until I found it in you and Fenris. And Isabela, with that kindness and warmth she thinks I can't see within her."

Marisol smiled sadly at the memory of her sauntering into the massive throne room of the Viscount's Keep, with that massive qunari tome beneath her arm and a determination born of the deepest love in her eyes, and she agreed silently with him.

Sebastian buried his fine aquiline nose into her neck, squeezing her tightly in his arms, almost as though he were afraid to let her go. "Simple belonging was no longer enough for me once I met the three of you. You asked me how I could be sure if this is what I truly wanted, and I'm telling you this is how I know. You stirred an ache in my heart I didn't know I had, and it's only at peace when I'm with you."

"Well, I'm sorry to be the one to have to tell you that ship's sailed. Isabela probably made off with it, I mean, she is a pirate after all. You'll have to make do only with me. I hope you find me adequate, with my bad jokes and my secret kinky shames," Marisol's tone was light but it cracked under the weight of heartache, and she could no longer hide it from him. "There's no more ease or gentle affection between us for you to covet and repent for. I wound Fenris by my very magically cursed existence, and Isabela broke my heart, and they both left me, and now I am alone but for you. And I'm terrified that I'll make a mess of _this_ too and drive you away, just like I did to them."

"I can't tell you what the future holds. I would like for you to come with me to Starkhaven, when the time comes. I'll give you no less than a prince, and I mean that. But I'm not going anywhere--I'm not going to leave you Mari, unless you no longer want me. No matter what happens, I want us to be together," Sebastian said solemnly. He kissed her deeply, and she still tasted salt upon his lips and tongue; hers, and his, mingled in tandem. She sighed blissfully, strengthened somehow by his promise. He'd always kept them, where she was concerned, and it moved her nearly to tears of joy.

 "I love you, Sebastian," Marisol whispered, clinging to him.

"And I you. But I'm not alone in that, Mari," Sebastian said gently. "Fenris aches for you. He may be too ashamed to say it, after what transpired between you, but that man loves you with all his heart, and he's in a great deal of pain, as much as you. I don't wish to come between you, or pry where it's not my concern, but I don't want to see either of you continue to suffer like this. You both mean too much to me, and I would help you if you wished it."

Marisol continued to cling to him, as the import of his heartfelt words sunk in. The funny thing about working with a Spirit of Love as a healer was that it made a mage somewhat sensitive to that sort of thing in general. She knew in her heart that Sebastian loved Fenris, the same way that she knew he loved her. Lascivious teasing and fantasies aside, she knew it was not simply a physical attraction. And Fenris was far too eager far too often to join her on imagined errands to hear Sebastian sing the Chant on the holy days, for her to believe that love was not shared, between the three of them.

To hear it, of course, was something else. She smiled even through the heartache, daring to hope despite herself. "I do wish it, Sebastian. For all our sakes," she said. Sebastian was able to read between the lines quite easily.

But it would still be a hollow victory, without her Bela to share in the happiness.

He sensed her melancholy about that, too, and kissed her shoulder in comfort. "You have a way of touching a person's soul, Mari. Being with you feels like opening my heart, like a book. It was like that for Fenris, too. He told me, when he warned me not to hurt you. I'm sure it was that way for Isabela too, and not everyone can handle that sort of vulnerability. It can be overwhelming," Sebastian said. "But it also changes you, irrevocably. And that's why I know she'll return to you, someday sooner rather than later. I saw a frightened woman in the Viscount's Keep that night. One who saw the depths to which you loved her and would fight to protect her, and believed herself unworthy. But I saw a good woman too, one who risked life and limb to return that tome, for no other reason than to save you, even though she knew it might cost her everything. That's no bond that simple fear will ever break."

Sebastian had a way about him that always made Marisol feel as though she could believe his words, no matter how stubborn her particular little gremlins were being on a given day. Perhaps it was because of his priest's demeanor, but he had a way of comforting her like no one else did, of cutting through the fog of her melancholy and grief, and reaching her with just the right words. Marisol did not simply hope that he was right about Isabela, but the way he spoke of her--the way he held her--well, it made her believe more than hope. It meant more to her than words could say.

And perhaps it was because she was thoroughly sated and blissful with promises made, but Marisol thought perhaps she heard love in his voice when he spoke of Isabela, the same way as Fenris. Oh, Bela goaded him constantly and pretended to be bored with him, but he gave as good as he got, and that was always the way to her Bela's affection. She wondered what she'd think of all this, whenever she returned.

"When" was something she believed in now, thanks to Sebastian, and she choked up a bit at the thought of it.

Then her stomach growled. 

"I'm hungry," Marisol announced suddenly.

Sebastian laughed. "Is it any wonder? It must be high noon at this rate. We should get something to eat." 

"You should bring us something," she said, tucking herself tighter under the blankets. "A lot of it. Pancakes--make me pancakes, Sebastian."

He couldn't stop laughing, even as he kissed her soundly on the cheek.

"As you wish, my Lady Hawke."


End file.
